Episode 57

Grandmother

The roundhouse is surrounded by a fence of white sticks. Smoke rises from the thatched roof. A bent tree loaded with red blossoms. You are not sure if she is home. You call out: there is no answer. Your need is great. You open the rough gate, fastened with old rope, hesitantly. The garden is wild, straggly, crowded. A dirt path leads to the house, and you follow it. A blue tempa cloth hangs in the doorway. Beads, knotted rope. You call again.

Nothing.

Movement, a slight rattle of a cowbell. There is a goat, half-hidden under the thorny tree. They look at you, inscrutable, their head heavy with horns. The breath. Or a sheep maybe. Time is slow…the breadth. The breadth? The breath. Something is